


Best RTO in the Business

by military_bluebells



Category: Generation Kill
Genre: During Canon, Episode: s01e05 A Burning Dog, Gen, Headcanon, Missing Scene, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-24
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-16 11:16:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28955580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/military_bluebells/pseuds/military_bluebells
Summary: “Can you imagine what the doctors would make of Ray Person?” Pappy says, sending a look his way before wiping the shaving cream off his chin.Brad's jaw clenches for a millisecond, “Need I remind you that he is the best damn RTO in the business?” he says without humour.
Relationships: Brad Colbert & Ray Person, Implied Brad Colbert/Ray Person
Comments: 10
Kudos: 12





	Best RTO in the Business

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nanuk_dain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nanuk_dain/gifts).



> This is to fill the following prompt given to me by **nanuk-dain** in the comment section of their fic Unit:
> 
> _Hmmm, I'm tempted to be evil and throw you a wee prompt here: a fic - length unimportant, can be really short or longer - on why Brad chose to be in the same Humvee as Ray even if he knew based from his experiences from Afghanistan how Ray gets when he's on stimulants. Ship or not, I don't care - whatever fits the bill and feels right._
> 
> I love writing things for you and I couldn't resist such a lovely prompt: you know exactly what I like to write :D Hope you enjoy it!

They set up a defensive perimeter in a wadi four klicks from a bridge that may have Iraqi soldiers waiting to ambush them. Surprisingly, the LT has been given the right intel and LAVs _were_ going to trigger the ambush instead of them, which gives them time for maintenance. The Reporter has disappeared to talk to some of the other Marines, Walt is up on the Mark-19 trying to work out what is causing the near-constant jams, and Trombley is collecting more water, leaving him and Ray relatively alone. 

Brad sits back against his door, aligning himself so that he can watch Ray clean the sand from the last Shamal out of their radio. He uncouples several wires from their ports, grouping them in his hand before holding them out. 

“Hold these.” He says around the pencil in his mouth. Brad offers his hand and Ray takes it, placing the bundle of wires in his palm and curling his fingers around them. He watches Ray take the pencil out of his mouth and brush parts of the inside casing with the eraser, removing the grains of sand from the components. Brad takes the opportunity to check how Ray’s burn are healing; they've scabbed over and less red at least, but he knows they are starting to itch: he’s seen Ray’s face twitch out of the corner of his eye as he tries not to scratch them. He will have to find out if Doc Bryan or Rudy had something to help with that, he can't have Ray distracted at the wheel. 

Ray reaches across and uncurls Brad's fingers, taking the wires out his palm and turning back to reassemble the unit now that he’s cleaned out the ports. He screws them back in place, reconnecting everything he’d dismantled efficiently. Brad watches his thin fingers move, noting his dirt crusted nails and the new callous that are developing on his fingers from the steering wheel. 

“Right, that should help reduce the static.” Ray says as he fits the outer casing on. Brad nods, grabbing the Kool Aid bottle off the dashboard, and taking a sip. Ray stretches his arms up and arching his back, groaning unenthusiastically. “Shit, I need stretch my legs, my ass is numb.” 

Brad snorts, shaking his head. He opened his mouth to reply when Trombley opens the rear driver’s side door. 

“Got the water, Sergeant.” 

“Good. I want you to monitor the hook and Walt,” 

“Yeah?” 

“If you need any help, get Trombley to assist you, I want to get him more familiar with the Mark-19.” If Walt catches a bullet, they don’t have anyone else to man it except maybe the Reporter, which he'd rather not consider. 

“Sure thing.” 

Brad nods and steps out of the Humvee, grabbing his M-16 and Kool Aid. He circles the hood to where Ray has gotten out and leaned back against the hood, his ridiculous Elvis shades over his eyes. 

“Want some dip?” Ray asks, pulling the tin out of thin air. 

“Sure.” Brad watches Ray scoop some out with his finger so he offers the index of his left hand. Ray shakes his head with a chuckle and smears the lump on his finger before scooping some for himself. 

“I’m gonna make sure Reporter hasn’t been kidnapped by horny Iraqis.” Ray says, slipping the tin back out of sight. 

Brad hums, "I think I'll walk to line, might see if I can find Eric." 

Ray nods, "He'll probably want to bitch about Captain America so he doesn't shoot him on sight." He pushes off the hood and offers out a fist. Brad snorts but bumps his knuckles softly against Ray's, rolling his eyes when Ray grins wide enough that his dimples appear. He walks backwards a step - Brad can feel his eyes racking over him - before saluting sloppily and swinging around to walk away from him. Brad shakes his head with a soft grin and slips the dip in between his bottom lip and his gum, quickly spitting into the grass. He pulls his shoulders back to correct his posture as he begins up the line: sitting in a Humvee made for short Marines isn’t a pleasant experience. 

If Brad couldn’t hear the unmistakable sound of LAV tracks on hard ground, he would be able to tell they are rolling out by the cries of ‘Get Some’ from his fellow Marines. Considering the last time they were faced by a hostile target, they were sent in without any support, reconnaissance or LAVs, the sudden change in strategy is enough to give a Marine severe whiplash. Still, Brad doubts this is a sign of command changing their minds permanently because until their strategy fails to get the results they want, they will continue to use it. He’s seen this many times from many different people so all he can do is operate in his mission parameters as best as he can. 

He spots Eric and Pappy on the last Humvee in the line, so he makes his way to them. He catches the last strands of a conversation as he arrives, “…even a broke ass clock is right twice a day.” He takes that to mean Pappy agrees with him on the change in strategy, but he has something else he wants to clear up. 

“What’s this I’m hearing about Casey Kasum going around in front E-3s and 2s calling Lieutenant Fick a coward?” Brad places his M-16 on the back of the Humvee and leans against it, holding his bottle in his hand. 

Pappy is shaving, cream still on his chin and razor in his hand as he nods shortly with pursed lips and looks away. Brad turns to where Eric is leaning back against the overhead frames, his feet resting on the backrests of the rear seats, and gets a defeated look and a soft, “Yeah…” in return. 

He hadn’t thought it would be true: Privates and Lance Corporals like to gossip, and any officers worth two shits wouldn’t bad mouth another in front of grunts and yet, here they are. “Jesus fucking Christ.” He says hotly, reaching up to remove the dip from his mouth and place on the rim of his bottle. 

“Well, at least we’re not in the position of having to babysit our platoon commander.” Pappy drawls, gesturing to Eric with his razor before resuming his shave. 

Brad looks to Eric and sees a worrying amount of apathy in his face. He wipes the spit from his hand on his pants and says, hoping to lift the atmosphere, “I heard back in the rear once they had a plan to push Navy psychiatrists forward to combat units.” Eric scoffs softly and Brad smiles, “Yeah, I scoffed then but if ever there was a candidate to be locked up in a rubber tent, we know who he is.” He shares a grin with the other guys as Pappy sets his tin cup down and picks up a small towel. 

“Can you imagine what the doctors would make of Ray Person?” Pappy says, sending a look his way before wiping the shaving cream off his chin. 

Brad's jaw clenches for a millisecond, “Need I remind you that he is the best damn RTO in the business?” he says without humour. He lets the rhetorical question sit for a second before continuing, “As long as you keep him away from uglier daughters and smaller livestock.” Pappy levels him with a look – amused and pitying in equal measure – but Brad doesn’t acknowledge it. “No,” He spits out the last of the nicotine-tinted saliva in his mouth, “the individual who needs his head examined is the man responsible for taking arguably the finest damn independent recon operators of any military in the world, and dropping us in Humvee platoons, to lead a parade of POGs, officers and heavily-armed subhuman morons like Casey Kasum across Mesopotamia.” 

Eric raises his eyebrows up and down, a frown pulling at his mouth as his eyes stay focused on his boots; Pappy shakes his head minutely. 

“How much does Uncle Sam spend on us?” Brad continues, “Jump school, dive school, mountain warfare, Ranger school, SERE. That’s a million dollars on average to train up 0321s like us.” He flicks his eyes to meet Eric’s before saying with hollow amusement, “And here we are, perfectly tuned Ferraris in a demolition derby.” 

Pappy inclines his head in agreement, raising his eyebrows up and down before looking over to Eric. Brad joins him and takes in the slumped curve of Eric’s shoulder, the defeat in his face when he says, “This sure isn’t Afghanistan.” They shares looks in a moment of silence. Brad is sure they’re remembering what he is: the satisfaction of being in control, reconning and executing clear missions expertly; of running as a team, alone except for each other, no officers in sight. 

Utter fucking bliss. 

The life comes back into Eric’s eyes then, although it’s a hollow sort of anger, the kind Ray gets when he’s crashing and pissed off at the same time, “Any of us had been running our teams in that AO, we sure as shit wouldn’t have dropped a bomb on that village like they did this morning.” 

“Gentlemen,” Brad says, holding up his Kool Aid bottle, “to Afghanistan.” 

Eric smirks a little – Ray would say that was progress – and reaches down to grab a grenade for the crate below him, bumping it against the bottle at the same time as Pappy taps it with his metal cup full of foamy water. Brad takes a sip from the bottle and they lapse back into silence, Eric staring off into the distance and Pappy finishing up his shave. Brad looks across the open wadi, taking in all the Marines milling around. 

“How is Ray anyway? I heard that he was going hard on the Ripped Fuel.” Eric asks, raising an eyebrow. 

“Goin’ hard’s an understatement.” Pappy chimes as he runs the shaver over his neck one last time. 

Brad gives them both what he hopes is a withering look, “While he is consuming more than in Afghanistan, I trust him to know his limits.” 

Even as he says it, it leaves a dull taste in his mouth: it’s a lie of omission. He trusts that Ray knows his exact dosage limit, but he doesn’t trust Ray to abide by it. There is a lot on his shoulders, especially as they’re pushed through hostile town after hostile town: one mistake by him could kill them all. What is worse is that he knows Ray knows that, too smart not to get to the same conclusion in half the time. The problem is Ray always sells a little of himself to whatever he does so now he's pushing himself far past his limit - towards the edge - and Brad is helpless to stop him because there is no one else who can do what Ray can half as well; He wouldn’t trust anyone else _but_ Ray to bear this, to not crumble in the middle of a dangerous situation and make it worse. All he can do is support him and cushion his fall. 

“I could barely deal him on the stuff in Afghanistan, I don’t know how you deal with him on even more.” Eric says with an amused shake of his head. 

Brad huffs, “It becomes white noise after a while and if it doesn’t interfere with the operation of my team, why should I care what he rambles about to keep himself entertained?”

He learnt that in Afghanistan because when Ray had first been temporarily transferred to replace Corporal Zalinski, he’d been insufferable, talking non-stop about stupid theories and sharing his truly awful music taste. Brad had spent hours grumbling about the falling standards of the Corps to Eric, Pappy, and Rudy, but he’d eaten his words by the end of their mission. 

Ray was an excellent Recon Marine. His skill with a radio had been far above what Brad had expected, as had his competence and dedication to his role: he’d been able to recite the codes of the top of his head without hesitation and he’d followed his orders perfectly without comment when Brad needed it most. The more skill he’d shown, the more Brad’s patience for his antics had increased until he’d actually enjoyed listening to the river of shit that came out of his mouth. On the _Dubuque_ , he’d observed Ray when the balanced between his brain and his mouth had been more stable and found that he liked the short, skinny, mouthy, white-trash hick from Buttfuck, Missouri. 

After reassignment, the first thing he’d done was request Ray for his new team, followed by Poke. He hasn’t been given cause to regret the decision, though he still holds to the fact that his skills are the only reason he’d requested Ray, even if it isn’t strictly true. 

He sits with Pappy and Eric for a while longer, taking the opportunity to shoot the shit about things that don’t include their commanding officers before returning to the Humvee. He relieves Trombley from the hook and takes his place, sending him to get some sleep. 

Walt drops down from the turret to crouch behind his shoulder, “I’m gonna trying reassembling it.” He says with a soft sigh. 

Brad nods, “Want some help?” 

“Sure.” 

Together, they take the Mark-19 apart one piece at a time, transporting every onto a piece of tarp spread out on the ground so that they don’t lose any of the pieces inside the Humvee where they have no chance of finding them. It would fit their current luck for such a thing to happen, so it isn’t worth tempting fate. Ray isn’t back by the time they finished disassembling the main gun, but Brad isn’t particularly worried, it’ll do him good to socialise with some more rambunctious marines while he has the opportunity: there is only so much energy he can get from their team. 

Brad leaves Walt to tend to his gun, sitting in Ray’s seat and finding his paper copy of the local area map. With his notepad and a borrowed pencil from Ray’s stash hidden in the dashboard, he drafts some possible ambush positions on the bridge that is currently halting their advance. The LAVs had met heavy resistance and he and Walt had watched from the Mark-19 as they’d rolled back with their wounded laying on their hoods. If Brad is right, Bravo will take point to complete their mission at some point during daylight hours. 

Walt sighs heavily and leans against the passenger door behind him. Brad turns to see him staring down at the pieces of the Mark-19, his hands hooked on the collar of his MOPP suit. 

“Well?” He asks, turning back to his map. 

“Without the right lubricant, it’s the same thing again and again. Sucker just jams.” 

“We’ll just have to accept that the only dependable weapon you have up there is your SAW.” Brad says. It isn’t ideal but they've had enough trouble obtaining the right lubricate a few days into the war so there’s little chance that the LT could pull another miracle out of his Kevlar. 

He hears boots on grass and then Ray’s voice appears, light and tuneful, “Hey, hey, hey.” He ducks through the window of the open driver door, “You guys, I just did a really dirty thing.” Brad looks up into Ray’s brown eyes as he pauses for dramatic effect before continuing, “You know that picture of Rolling Stone’s girlfriend?” 

“I think it’s safe to say we all know her intimately at this point.” He deadpans. After Reporter made the mistake of showing the picture to them, it has been passed around to the enjoyment of many and last he heard it was with Bravo Three, circulating one of Eric’s teams. 

“Well, I got it back from Bravo Three, and I swear I was going to give it back to him, but I ran into Wasik on the way over here.” Ray pauses and Brad looks up just in time to see Ray lift his Kevlar up and through the window and say proudly, “I traded that bitch for some PEC-2 batteries!” He laughs softly. 

Brad pauses for a second to consider if he should be disturbed by Ray’s amorality or impressed by his ingenuity. He decides to test the water, “Ray, you pimped her out.” 

Ray’s grin is bright when he looks up, his ridiculous Elvis shades push up onto his head, “She is a dirty little hoochie, isn’t she?” He drawls, his grin turning mischievous. Brad pauses for a split second, taking the look in Ray's eyes - teasing and every bit as light as he'd hoped - and the way his eyebrows curve and the sharp points of his dimples, before shaking any thoughts it generated off. He grins back then, looking down at the batteries. It is an impressive bounty. He grabs the box out of Ray’s Kevlar and asks, “Got any for the thermals?” 

“Jesus, dude. It’s a picture of a reporter’s girlfriend, not of J.Lo’s cum-dripping twat.” Ray replies, his eyebrows moving emphatically and his voice dripping condescendence as if Brad is being deliberately dense. 

Brad huffs a laugh, considering that it was probably a stupid question, “Yeah, you’re right.” He opens the box and checks that there are in fact batteries inside, but Ray never disappoints, the batteries are there and seem in good condition. In addition, now that Ray is here, Walt can get some sleep along with Trombley. He turns his head towards Walt and says, “Walt, get some sleep.” before turning back to his map. 

“I’m gonna give this another try, Brad.” Walt’s hand hits the Humvee, “You get some sleep.” 

Brad takes a good look at Walt, who seems restless and irritated and not at all capable of resting. Besides, while Walt's baby is currently decorating the ground, he won’t get any sleep. "Thanks, Walt.” He takes the hook from under his shoulder strap and holds it out as Ray rounds the driver door, putting his map and notepad in his seat and the pencil back in its stash. 

Ray’s hand closes around the top of the hook, his palm pressing against the back of Brad’s hand. It’s warm and softer than Brad expected, only covering down to where his thumb met his hand. Brad smiled softly, letting his hand linger as he ducks out of the Humvee, savouring the warm and the touch before pulling away and grabbing his Kevlar from the top of the Humvee. He checks his watch, which read 18:58 as he makes his way over to the other open ranger grave under the pitched canopy that partially conceals their Humvee. He checks that Trombley is asleep as he’d been instructed – which he is – before settling in the other grave, grabbing the blanket at the foot and pulling up to his head. There is just enough space in the grave for him to curl on his side, his head resting on a bag. He settles down and focuses on his breathing until he falls asleep.


End file.
